Time-dependency of the 137Cs contamination of wild boar from a region in Southern Germany in the years 1998 to 2008.

Following the Chernobyl accident, (137)Cs contamination levels of wild boar in some districts of Southern Germany are still exceeding thousands of Bq kg(-1). While the long term (137)Cs concentration in forest plants, mushrooms, and roe deer meat has decreased significantly, for wild boar it has remained constant during the last decade. Between 1998 and 2008, we analysed the muscle meat of 656 wild boars shot in the district ("Landkreis") Ravensburg. The (137)Cs activity concentration showed considerable variability from less than 5 up to 8266 Bq kg(-1) and it followed a seasonal pattern, which is attributed to changes in dietary habits, fodder availability, meteorological conditions and specific behaviour of (137)Cs in wild boar organism. T(ag) values for wild boars from the district Ravensburg varied from 0.008 to 0.062 m(2)kg(-1) during 2000-2008.